


The Dark And The Light

by casstayinmyass



Series: Fandoms and Horror Movies [4]
Category: Jigsaw (2017), Saw (Movies), Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Actual Romance Amidst All This Horror, Alternate Universe - Fusion, Alternate Universe - Horror, Alternate Universe - Saw Fusion, BAMF Rey, Blood and Gore, Blood and Violence, Body Horror, Boys Kissing, Everybody Loves Finn, F/M, Finn Needs A Hug, Homophobia, Horror, Hux Has No Chill, Kylo Ren is Not Nice, M/M, Minor Jessika Pava/Rey, Not for the squeamish, Poe Dameron Hurts So Prettily, Saw Movies, Survival Horror, You Have Been Warned
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-06
Updated: 2018-02-06
Packaged: 2019-03-14 14:48:39
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 7
Words: 12,799
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13592379
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/casstayinmyass/pseuds/casstayinmyass
Summary: Six strangers wake up in a strange place. Soon, they discover they're players in a sinister game for their lives. How far will they go to survive? Detective Organa and her husband, Police Chief Solo, race to beat the clock and find the victims, including their son, before it's too late.





	1. The First Piece

**Author's Note:**

> Fair warning-- this is incredibly gory, and probably upsetting if you don't want to read about your favourite characters getting wrecked in the worst ways possible. Be prepared!
> 
> Some of the traps are original, but some of them are borrowed from the 2017 movie Jigsaw. It was a good movie.

A whirring noise came to life in the darkly lit room, waking six strangers. The only thing visible was their eyes and hands-- their heads were covered by identical metal buckets.

On the far end, brown eyes belonging to a tall, fairly built man blinked open. He had pale hands, covered in freckles. Beside him wide blue eyes opened, ginger eyebrows furrowed over them. Beside him dark, almost black eyes blinked, then amber with a single brown curl falling down, another pair of brown eyes with messy brown hair and long eyelashes, and brown with long black hair falling into them and down to her torso from the bucket. Soon, five out of the six people were awake, and as they each adjusted to where they were, the panic set in.

"What the fuck...?" someone from the middle muttered. He tried to stand, but wobbled a little. The man beside him tried to reach up and figure out what was on his head by grabbing the bucket, and rubbed his back in the process. The young woman beside him looked around, realizing how many other people were here as well.

Someone on the end got up, and began to hit the wall. "Let me out of this fucking thing!" he shouted, pounding angrily, “I can’t see out of my right eye!” The woman on the far end blinked, too paralyzed with fear to move, and the one blue eyed man began to scream.

Just then, the power flickered, and a voice came in.

_"There has been an awakening. I have felt it."_

"Who's there?!" blue eyes demanded.

_"You're probably all wondering what you're doing here. You see, ladies and gentlemen, there are two sides to the world... the dark, and the light. The universe is a balance between them-- the force of our existence."_

"The fuck is he talking about?" the woman with black hair muttered.

_"We are all a balance of light and dark, but sometimes, there are people who fall on the wrong side of the scale... those who are darker than the rest of us."_

"GET US OUT OF HERE!" head-grabber shouted, and let out a noise as intense pain emanated down his back.

_"You all fall in that category. Each one of you has committed a crime that cost someone their life. It is your time to atone."_

"What the fuck is this, vigilante justice?!" amber eyes asked, looking around.

_"A sacrifice of blood will set you free... however small. Let your training begin."_

Suddenly, the metal collars around their necks tightened, and they began to straighten out. The black haired woman's eyes widened.

"Look."

Everyone turned to see in front of them that their chains were attached to a wall of buzz saws. And they started to move.

"Oh shit," head-grabber whispered, and the brown haired woman swallowed. Blue eyes began to scream desperately again, and black hair began to pound the ground. Tall guy started trying to kick the wall behind them in, but he just ended up getting choked out even more by his tugging chain.

"We're gonna die, holy--" head-grabber breathed.

"Sure looks like it, buddy," amber-eyes commented beside him, "This is not how I thought my morning would go." Head-grabber let out a noise in response.

"Who the fuck let comic relief over there into the room, huh?!" tall guy shouted, disoriented from being half blinded, "We're gonna be turned into pulp in a second!"

"Do you have any master ideas, dark and brooding?!" amber-eyes blurted, "Cause I'd gladly shut my mouth and listen to them!"

The saws buzzed closer as they were pulled.

"An offering of blood," brown hair whispered. "An offering of blood!"

"What?" head-grabber asked, turning to her.

"The voice, it said blood, we need to give blood, and we'll be free."

"Great, oh how splendid," blue eyes snapped.

"She's right," black hair nodded, "Everyone, cut your arm on the saws!"

Brown hair held out her arm, holding back tears. Head-grabber watched her, and did as she was doing.

"Can't believe I'm doin' this," amber-eyes whispered, and copied the two. Black hair held out her arm as well.

"Wait! Wait, someone's not waking up," the young woman with the brown hair whispered, noticing the man on the other side of black hair. "Hey, he's not waking up!"

"Fuck him, that's his fucking problem, lady!" the tall guy shouted, and she looked over.

"He's going to get _ripped_ to pieces!"

"So are we!" the guy with the amber eyes interjected grimly, and everyone looked forward to the buzzing saws, which were now inches away.

"Fuck," tall guy gritted out, and held his arm up too. Blue-eyes grimaced, whining and moaning to himself as he held out a single finger, waiting for the saw to cut him.

"We have to wake him up!"

Black hair tried kicking him awake, but that ended up getting her chain twisted, and she flipped around backward. "Oh my god!" she screamed, struggling to turn back around. Brown hair tried to help her, but she wasn't close enough.

"Keep your arms steady!" amber-eyes called, "And brace yourselves!"

Brown hair was forced to give up on black hair and the shorter sleeping man, and turned forward, holding her arm out and closing her eyes. Everyone heard screaming, and the sound of flesh being ripped to tatters. Tall guy's door opened. Blue eyes poked his finger on the blade, breaking his nail and sending blood splattering all over his bucket, but his door opened. Amber eyes cut his forearm deeply, and his opened. Head-grabber's hand hit the saw, opening his door, and brown eyes chanted to herself, putting herself somewhere else so that she wouldn't feel the pain of her shoulder being torn open. Her door opened.

Beside her, black hair still couldn't untwist her chain-- the saws sliced clean through her black leather jacket, but a few seconds goring her back was all it took to open her door. They all heard the panicked screams and lack thereof of the poor man on the end, who was not so lucky. Before the doors to the little metal room closed, they saw his blood spray all over the walls. Everyone remained silent from shock, and it took a good three minutes for the six left to catch their breath.

"Well," amber-eyes said, holding his bleeding arm, "Nice to meet you all."

\-----

Leia stood over the table in the morgue, shaking her head.

"Dopheld Mitaka."

"He was only 19 years old," Rose said, and Leia inspected the piece missing from the neck.

"And wanted for vandalism. He was responsible for that elderly couple veering off into the lake in the middle of the night, after he painted that exit sign wrong, remember?"

"I remember."

"It doesn't make sense."

"I think it makes perfect sense," Rose whispered beside her, "But we just don't wanna say it."

"Tico, the man you're talking about has been dead for decades, it's impossible."

"Who's this we're talking about?" Officer Solo came in, and his wife, Detective Organa, turned with the coroner.

"Nobody." "Plagueis."

They both spoke at the same time, and Leia gave a weary sigh. "Nobody important," she countered, and Han came over, rubbing her back.

"You've been working late this week. I've got a bad feeling about this-- I get the sense you're onto something."

"I'm a detective. Isn't that a good thing?"

"Not when you spend all night holed up with a bunch of dead bodies and a kooky coroner-- no offense, Rose." Rose tried not to glare.

"You wouldn't understand, you're a cop," Leia said.

"Police chief."

"I rest my case."

"Leia, you've been working ever since Ben disappeared."

Leia stared down at the slab the decapitated body was resting on. "He should have complied. We could've talked to the chief--"

"We would have done no such thing," Han said sternly, "That kid's gotta learn somehow."

"He's our son, Han!"

Rose turned around, finding something to do. She felt as if she was intruding on a personal conversation, which... she was.

"He ran away when the cops came after him. Nobody knows where he is now," Han sighed.

"There's a chance we could find him. They're looking for him!"

"Of course they're looking for him, he's wanted all over this damn city!" Han barked back. His face softened, and he slotted his fingers under his wife's chin, tilting her head up. It was comforting, and Leia closed her eyes. "I miss him as much as you do. I'm just as worried as you are, but they're doing the best they can."

Leia nodded, and turned back to the mangled body.  "This man, Mitaka, was found strung up from a park bridge... what's left of him, anyway."

"His head was cut by a very sharp blade," Rose came back to the table, holding the reports, "And traces of rust were found on them." She pointed to the mark in the neck. "A puzzle piece."

"So?" Han frowned.

"It's a copycat, obviously," Leia shook her head again, "Rose here is convinced it's Snoke Plagueis, back from the dead."

"Trust me," Han looked at the coroner, "I've seen a lot of buddies in the force get killed. They never come back."

"Snoke died of cancer ten years ago," Leia explained, "There's no way it could be him." She tugged her sleeve down, hiding her scars. She knew firsthand what that man had done... and she knew firsthand how dead he really was.

"What's that?" Han asked, looking over at Rose cleaning something off with some saline and hibitane.

"The first piece to the puzzle," the short woman said, staring at the digital chip she held between clamps.


	2. The Oven

"AGH! Agghhhahhaaaaa!"

The room was dark and smelled of iron. The black haired woman was on the ground, sobbing from her wounds, and brown hair was dabbing at them with the remains of the woman's jacket, gently stroking her hair away from her face with soft words of comfort.

" _You're alright,"_ she whispered.

 _"Thanks, honey,"_ the black haired woman winced.

"My finger!" blue-eyes was wailing, and tall guy scoffed.

"Stop being a pussy."

"I'm not... being... a pussy!" blue-eyes shouted, and to his great surprise, he chucked his bucket off, drop kicking it across the room. He had pale skin, just like his antagonist, and a shock of ginger hair, standing out against his icy eyes. His lips were downturned in a permanent scowl, made worse by their current situation.

They all soon realized their buckets weren't tightened onto their restraints any longer.

"My turn," amber-eyes muttered, and pulled his bucket off. Out from underneath sprung thick brown curls of hair, and a handsome, olive-toned face. He held his bucket under his arm like a pilot's helmet. Head-grabber stared at him for a moment, unable to do anything but gawk, until the other man spoke. "Name's Poe, Poe Dameron. Pilot from Guatemala."

"Finn," head-grabber said, then quickly remembered he still had his bucket on. "F-Finn Kenobi!" He pulled the contraption on to reveal black hair, soulful brown eyes, and dark skin, “I’m a server at a breakfast joint.” Now it was Poe's turn to stare.

"Wow. Good to meet you, buddy," Poe breathed with a smile, and Finn nodded.

"What are you, a couple of queers?" tall guy ripped off his contraption, sending it to the ground with a thud. He had wavy, shoulder length brown hair, and an intriguingly angled face that could be considered handsome to some. A scar cut down across his right cheek over his eye, that looked fresh—probably as a result of the recent blinding by their captor.

Poe glared over at him. "What's it to you what I am? We'd be tenderized meat if we didn't survive that back there, less than people."

"Exactly. So why should we give a fuck about introductions?"

"Because it's comforting," brown hair got up, "It makes us feel like we're talking to people, not bucket-heads." She took hers off. What used to be a tied bun was now a messy wad of hair stuck to her forehead, and she blew it out of her eyes. "I'm Rey. Astrophysicist."

"Hi," Finn said, and Poe nodded to her.

"I am Armitage Hux, former assistant manager of a tech company," the ginger haired man finally sniffed, "But you may all call me Hux."

"Jessika!" the black haired girl called up, thrashing her bucket off and grimacing, "Jessika Pava. I'd shake all of your hands, but I'm a little busy bleeding all over myself here."

"Jessika Pava?" Poe frowned, rushing over, "From D'Quar High?"

She looked up. "How d'you know where I went to school?"

"I went there too! Don't you remember me?! Captain of the soccer team, we used to smoke together, by the bike racks?!"

"Poe fucking Dameron," the Asian beauty grinned, "Son of a bitch, you had grade A shit."

"That's why you hung out with me," Poe laughed, and the two shared a smile. "Where did you go after high school?"

"Became an escort," she shrugged, "Only thing I knew how to do was screw good.”

"Who are you, then?" Rey asked tall guy, and he scoffed, rolling his eyes.

"If it makes you feel better to know, I'm Ben Solo."

Rey nodded. "It's nice to meet you, Ben." He just sneered at her, and brushed past. "Okay, not so nice."

Ben began to search around the walls. "Look, sorry if I’m not in the mood to hold hands. Whoever brought us here thought it’d be fun to blind my right eye, and FUCK, it hurts!”

“Same with my back,” Finn nodded, feeling it. The skin was raised there, almost like a scar… it was fresh, just like the one on Ben’s face, and when he checked, his fingertips were stained red.

Ben pounded on the wall. “There's gotta be some way out of here." 

"Whoever that was over the speakers is watching us," Poe said.

"And he knows stuff about us," Finn added, looking down nervously.

Poe nodded. "Obviously, he's crafted all of this real carefully."

"It's almost like he thinks of it as a game," Rey said, biting her nails, and Jess pointed.

"Yes, and that's good. You know why?"

"Because games can be won," Poe said, and Ben pounded on the wall.

"Okay, when all of you are done your sick fantasy circle jerk over there, does somebody want to come and help me find a way out?"

"There won't be an obvious way out," Finn spoke up, "Like Rey said... it's a game."

"Then... where do we possibly go from here?" Hux sighed. Just then, the lights went out, and the room took on a red light.

_"I'm so glad you asked, Hux."_

"Oh no..."

"Aw, he's back," Finn carded a hand through his short hair.

"W-what do you want with me?!" Hux cried.

_"One year ago, you were responsible for the deaths of an entire building full of people. The reason? A selfish one, that you have yet to admit. I'm sure your new friends are just dying to know how you did it... care to confess?"_

The lights came back on, and everyone looked at Hux apprehensively, backing away. He scowled at them all. "Oh, like you haven't all done something wrong. Don't you remember what he said? He said we were all responsible for someone's death!"

"Buddy, that's a lot of someones," Poe said.

"All of you are hypocrites. Hypocrites! I didn't do anything wrong!"

Suddenly, his neck restraint tightened, leaving only a little room for him to breathe.

"AH! I... I swear, it wasn't my fa- _ahhh_!" It tightened even more, and he clawed at his neck. "Very well! Alright! I... I pressed the button. I did it. I killed all those people, I set a bomb off in the elevator. But they shouldn't have fired me!"

"Let me get this straight," Jessika said, "You got fired, so you thought blowing everyone up was a good idea?"

"It's not as if you are morally superior, you whore," Hux snapped, and his chain suddenly yanked him to the wall, pinning him there as the wall flipped around. The four in the other room smacked the wall and banged on it, as did Hux on the other side, but it was no use. He was sealed in.

A television behind the four turned on, and they got a feed of the room Hux was in, watching him bang for help.

"What's... what's going on?!" he blurted.

_"You have ninety seconds to escape the Oven. The wall opposite you has been heated to 350 degrees."_

"Jesus," Poe frowned in the other room, subconsciously unzipping his brown jacket. Ben stared at it in morbid transfixion. A row of elevator-style buttons rose up from the floor, appearing in front of a desperate Hux.

_"Each of these buttons has a number. Choose the right one, and the oven door will open. Every wrong button chosen will heat the oven 5 degrees more. If you have not chosen correctly in ninety seconds, your chain will be retracted, and you will burn."_

"Oh, dear god, dear _god_!" Hux screamed, clutching at his hair, "I can't, I--"

 _"You know better than anyone Hux, that to press the button on a detonator, all you need is a finger."_ There was a pause. _"If one of the others sacrifices such an appendix, the oven will turn off, and you will be set free. How many lives is a job worth? Let the game begin."_

The buttons began to glow, but Hux ignored them in favour of pounding on the wall again.

"DID YOU HEAR HIM?! SOMEBODY CUT THEIR BLOODY FINGER OFF, NOW!" Hux screamed. The five in the other room all looked between one another.

"I..." Rey looked down at her shaking hand, "I can't do it!"

"He wants us to cut a finger off?" Finn blurted, "For _that_ guy?"

"Sick fuck, he's probably watchin' somewhere, getting off on this," Poe glared around the ceilings. 

"HURRY!" Hux shouted, and Jessika clenched her jaw.

"Let him figure the buttons out. It's not up to us to save his ass... he needs to do what the guy said. Atone."

The five turned back to the TV, and Hux let out a frustrated noise, realizing nobody was going to help him. He raced over to the buttons, and began to read them.

"4... 49... 23.... 45... 57..." He clutched his head, feeling the sweat rolling down his temples. "None of these mean anything to me!"

"Maybe they're combinations?!" Finn called.

"To what?!" Hux screeched. He pressed 45. The room got hotter. "No!" By now, the five could physically see the waves of heat through the monitor, and Rey turned away, unable to watch.

"I DON'T KNOW! I DON'T KNOW THE ANSWER TO YOUR STUPID GAME!" Hux shouted. He slammed a hand down on 23... his skin began to singe as the room heated up even more.

"Press them all!" Rey shouted.

"No, don't do that!" Ben snapped, "You're gonna fry yourself!"

"Oh lord, oh my--" Hux muttered to himself. It was getting hard to see through the intense heat, and he could hear the sizzle of the wall behind him. He thought of how many people were waiting on the other side... did they really think his life wasn't worth a finger?!

Worth. What a life is worth. "How many lives is a job worth!" he shouted.

"What?!"

"MY GOD, I'VE GOT IT!" Hux blurted. "The numbers, it's how many people were in the building! It's how many people died in the explosion!"

"Quick, hit it!" Finn shouted.

"Do it, slam the button!" Poe called.

"My boss... the manager..." Hux began to count, his brain working in slow motion at the high heat. He was getting dizzy... heat stroke was setting in fast. 

"What are you waiting for?!" Ben yelled.

"I'm counting!" Hux snapped. "My coworkers, there were five of them... warehouse, sixteen..." His blue eyes lit up. "Forty-nine, it was fort--!"

Suddenly, a loud beeping went off, and Hux's hands flew to his neck as his chain snatched him back. He let out a loud, blood curdling scream as his back met the burning hot wall, the surface easily sizzling through his clothes and boiling his blood. His body lit on fire in seconds, head exploding into pieces and splattering the camera.

The five in the opposite room stood there, gaping at the monitor. From what they could still see, more blood dripped from the wall to the ground... all that was left of arsonist Armitage Hux.

_"It appears that Hux has learned his lesson. If only he had confessed sooner."_

Finn grasped Rey's hand, but she jerked it away, throwing her boot up at the screen and smashing the glass.

"WHO ARE YOU?! WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS?!"

The one remaining wall beside them opened up, revealing a dingy looking medical room.

"Do we have to go in there?" Finn breathed, and Poe put a hand on his shoulder.

"You just saw what the guys capable of. I'd say yeah."

\----

"We've got press all over the place, lined up out there," Han grumbled. Leia looked up from where an FBI hacker they had brought in named DJ was extracting the files from the chip they had found in Mitaka's neck.

"Not surprised. Especially with this new body."

"Same puzzle piece missing?" Han asked Rose, and she nodded.

"This time, on the finger."

Han looked down, regarding the body that been burned to a crisp. "That must've hurt."

"A lot," Rose agreed, "This puzzle piece fits perfectly into the one from the kid's body."

"You don't still think it's Snoke?"

Rose bit her lip. "It's the only conclusion that makes sense right now."

"There's a billion other conclusions that make a whole hell of a lot more sense than a zombie coming back to torture people, Tico."

"G-g-got it," DJ smirked from the computer, and they all gathered around. "There are two files, an audio one, and the code to a feed on the deep web."

"The deep web?" Leia frowned.

"Oh yeah. You don't wanna go there," Rose put her hands up, "Creepy stuff happens there."

"I think this'll b-b-blow anything else out of the w-w-water," DJ said, pressing play, "Take a listen."

_"Greetings, Mrs. Organa. I see you've found the first piece to the puzzle. It has been many years... it looks like the lesson you learned did not get passed on to your son."_

DJ typed the code into the search of the deep web, and a window popped up.

"Ben," Leia breathed, and Han looked closer.

"Where are you getting this?"

"Like I s-s-said..." DJ held the chip up, shaking it.

Through the window on the screen, they had a clear view of the five people in the current medical room, looking around aimlessly. Leia and Han looked to the tallest one in the room.

"My god. Can you do a scan, see if you can get the location?" Leia asked.

"Every s-s-single location binary is encrypted," DJ muttered, "Imp-p-possible to tell where they are... but I'll keep trying."

"Dammit..." Han cursed, and Leia looked up at him with a knowing gaze.

"It _is_ him, Han. He's come back."


	3. The Vaccination

"What are all these things?" Jessika asked, inspecting the medical tools around them. The room was filled with a light steam.

"Don't ask questions," Rey whispered, chewing on her thumbnail, "He'll answer them."

Suddenly, Finn picked something up from the wash basin. It said "Play Me". 

"Should I?" he asked.

"Do we have a choice?" Ben bit out. Rey shook her head.

"Go on, Finn. Play it."

Finn pressed play on the tape recorder, and they all listened.

" _You are in an unsanitary room with unsanitary tools. Why? Because one of you has done unsanitary things. On the night of February 6th, three years ago, one of you took a life out of revenge using a dirty tool, one that is easy to find in a room like that one. But it was not your life to take."_

Everyone looked around. Poe put his hands up and shook his head, Finn shrugged, Rey looked to Ben, and Ben crossed his arms, shaking his head. That left Jessika. They all turned to her.

"You?" Rey asked.

She began to shake. "Oh god... I'm next. He's gonna kill me next, isn't he?"

"No, nobody's gonna kill you," Poe came over, taking her arm, "What did he mean?"

"Yeah, tell us," Finn nodded, "He's all about confessions, right? Maybe if you confess, he'll give you a pass."

Jessika swallowed, her eye makeup running down. "W-what if he doesn't?"

"Confess," Rey encouraged softly.

"For all of our sakes, hurry the fuck up," Ben snapped, and Jessika glared at him.

"You're just as bad as Hux. Why don't you have to cut your foot off or something?"

"I'm sure it'll be my turn sooner or later today, honey," the tall brunette hissed. Poe stared at her, a little desperately.

"Jess?"

Jessika moaned, crossing her arms. "Okay. Alright, fine. Three years ago, I was working this job, right? Some upper class businessman. Anyway, he cuts me this bullshit excuse after we finish that he can't pay me, he needs his money for his heroin or whatever." 

"Real classy lifestyle you lead," Ben nodded, and Rey punched him hard in the face. The tall man stumbled, then screwed up his face and charged, ready to hit her back, but Poe and Finn stepped in front of her. Ben scowled at them, blood dripping from his nose. 

"Just stop!" Finn blurted to the ceiling, "Hasn't there been enough bloodshed?!"

"Yes," Rey said, "So let's let Jess finish." She put a hand on the sobbing woman's arm, and Jessika continued.

"I was broke. I had 61 cents in my pocket, and I was gonna get thrown out of the shitty apartment I lived in. Girls like me, we don't get second chances. I was terrified for my life."

"Why didn't you find me?" Poe asked softly.

"I'd heard you'd settled down with someone," she sniffled, "I didn't want to show up at your front doorstep and ruin your life."

"You're... with someone?" Finn asked Poe, shuffling awkwardly. Poe's jaw visibly clenched.

"I was."

Finn looked down. "I'm sorry." Poe bit his lip.

"Yeah, me too."

"Anyway, I was in a really fucking bad place. I didn't know what to do, I was so pissed-- he had asked me to do sick shit I'd rarely ever been asked to do, and I did it because it would've paid at least six months rent. But he fucked me over."

"And you got revenge," Rey finished.

"While he was sleeping," Jessika managed out, "I looked in his bag, and found his needles. There were three of them, all full of black tar heroin."

"Shit, tell me where to find this guy," Ben joked.

"You can find him at the fucking cemetery, dipshit, I pumped his neck so full of heroin his blood vessels popped." The four others stared at her with a newfound fascination. Finn even looking a little jumpy. Jessika's eyes closed, and she rubbed them with the heel of her hand. "But that does not make me a murderer."

"Well, you killed someone," Ben cocked his head, "So--"

"I didn't mean to!"

The lights went out, and they were plunged into darkness.

"Shit."

"Oh god, oh god, he's gonna kill me, fuck," Jessika began chanting, and she felt comforting arms around her.

_"The man you killed was not a good man. Not by far. But you killed him out of spite, out of anger, and for personal gain... that crosses over into the dark side."_

"I didn't mean to, I--!"

_"All five of you are currently breathing in a steam that contains a deadly disease, created to wipe out entire populations in mere minutes. It has been five minutes, and it will be another three before you all succumb to it. The way out is through Jessika Pava's salvation."_

"Christ!"

"LET US OUT!"

"God, we gotta get outta here!"

_"On the laboratory table, you will find a case with three syringes. One is a harmless saline solution.... one is enough heroin to kill you in seconds... and one is water riddled with the disease you are currently breathing."_

"Oh shit!" Finn cried.

The lights came back on, and all five turned to look at the table. Sure enough, the black case waited for them. It had Jessika's name on it.

"Look... look, I'll do it," Poe offered, and Ben scoffed.

"Sure. You'll let Hux burn up for a finger, but for the hot chick, you'll kill yourself."

"It's not like that."

"No?"

"No. Like you said pal," Poe got up in his face, "I'm the biggest queer you'll ever meet." Ben made a face, and Finn smirked a little.

"No. I-It has to be me," Jessika said, "It has my name on it, and... I don't think this guy'll take kindly to cheating."

Poe's lips settled into a firm line, and Jessika brushed her hair back, going over to the case and opening it.

"You'd better get going," Ben told her, "We have what, two minutes left?" He gestured to the ticking clock on the wall.

"Ben's right, we're all going to succumb to the disease if you don't pick soon," Rey said, biting her nails again.

“You’re a scientist, aren’t you?” Jess asked, “Don’t you know shit about liquids and medicine?” Rey raised an eyebrow.

“Astrophysicist. I study the stars.”

Jess took a deep breath. “That’s a lot of help, honey.” She looked down at the case. She had experience with heroin-- she knew was it looked like, so at least she wouldn't pick the one that would kill you in seconds. That just left the one that would kill you in minutes, and the one that... well, wouldn't kill you.

"PICK, you dumb bitch!" Ben shouted, looking at the clock, and she nodded to herself assuredly, opening the lid. The blood left her face. Every liquid looked the same.

"W-which one is it?" she whined, and Finn held his head in his hands. Poe knocked his head against the wall, pounding and shouting obscenities in Spanish up at the cameras, and Rey inspected the needles closely.

"Is there any difference, any at all?"

"No, I... I don't think so!" Jess cried, tears streaming down her cheeks.

"Fucking choose, choose!" Ben shouted at her, and she covered her eyes, screaming.

"I can't, I can't, they all look the fucking same!"

"I'll choose for you then, here!" Ben grabbed all three, but Rey wrestled him away. This time, Ben grabbed her back, taking a swipe at her, and the needles barely grazed her skin. Rey looked at the single drop of blood the scratch produced from her arm, then back up at Ben. He looked utterly horrified, but that didn't stop her-- she tackled him so fast he dropped the needles to the ground.

"Choose, please, choose," Finn encouraged Jess, hands holding her upright as her knees gave out.

"I can't do this, I can't," she was chanting.

"You have to!"

"You shouldn't have to, Jess, but you do," Poe said, "Dammit, we've got twenty seconds left!"

Ben finally kicked Rey off of him, and scrambled up. "Twenty seconds! Look, ten now! I am not dying because of some fucking murderer whore who can't pick a fucking needle!"

"Jess!" Poe shouted.

"Jess!" Finn grabbed her shoulder.

"Jess," Rey begged, and the other woman stooped down, closed her eyes, and grabbed a needle, jamming it into her arm. Suddenly, there was a noise as bright lights came on and better illuminated the room. They stood there in horror, watching Jessika as she stared back, eyes squeezed shut.

After a while, she was still in one piece, and nothing had happened. She opened her eyes, and breathed a sigh of relief.

"Oh my god," Poe grinned, hugging her to him tightly. She smiled and hugged him back, more tears rolling down her cheeks.

"You're okay," Finn smiled, and Rey joined in the hug. The door opened, leading to what looked like a barn.

"One step closer to beating this game," Poe said, and stepped through the entranceway. They all started to walk through, and the door behind them closed as they all made it into the dusty barn.

"A barn?" Rey looked around, "Where are we?"

"Smells like cow shit," Ben muttered.

"Maybe if we look around, we'll find another one of those play me things," Finn said, and they nodded, searching around in the expanse of hay and dirt. Rey searched the back area, finding nothing but more straw. Poe found a creepy stuffed scarecrow, holding where in one hand should be a pitchfork, some pliers. Finn covered his mouth-- he found the old, decomposing head of a pig behind a barrel, the smell nearly making him puke. He was surprised he hadn't puked already. Ben completely disregarded what the others were doing-- he was determined to find a way out, so he just kept trying to punch and kick his way through the walls. They were surprisingly sturdy for old wood.

Just as they were all about to give up and meet back in the middle of the spooky barn, they heard a noise from the lofts, where Jessika was investigating.

"Jess?" Finn called up. No answer.

"Jessika!" Rey shouted as well, and Poe jogged over.

"Hey! You up there? What's wrong?"

Suddenly, they heard choking noises, and a couple drops of blood fell down.

"Jess?!" Poe yelled, and suddenly, Jessika came flying down, hitting the ground hard face up. Rey screamed, clutching Finn, and Ben's eyes widened.

Jessika's entire jaw had burned away, leaving a mess of blood and foam. Her eyes had also burst, as had her stomach, and bits of her skull were showing. Her body was still jerking as she made little noises... a couple of seconds later, she fell silent.

"Oh god," Finn shook his head, "Oh god--" he ran over, and tipped his head into the barrel, vomiting. Poe's mouth was hanging open, and Rey had her eyes covered. Even Ben looked a little sick to his stomach.

"The disease."

"What?" Ben looked at Rey.

"She injected the disease," Rey whispered, hands shaking. "It takes time to kill you. She thought she injected the saline, but she injected the GOD DAMN disease!"

"Fuck," Poe gritted out, "FUCK!" he shouted, and got up, kicking hay. He kicked it until her entire body was covered, and out of sight.

\------

"Have you found a location yet?" Leia asked. She had just returned to the office outside the morgue from the station, where she had informed the serial homicide investigation team she had together what they were dealing with, and how they could handle this. DJ leaned back in his chair.

"I'm trying my b-b-best."

"You look like you're slacking off," she retorted, and DJ held his hands up.

"I can't d-d-do anything but wait."

Leia nodded. "Keep trying. I want to find my son in one piece... and help those other poor people." She looked at the screen, watching the strangers mill around the large, empty barn aimlessly.


	4. The Cyclone

Poe kicked some more hay.

"You cared about her," Rey looked up from the gruesome remains of Jessika, "Why were you so close to her?"

Poe covered his face, sitting down. "She..." he sighed. "She was the first person I came out to. She was the only person who accepted me when I got together with my high school sweetheart, Snap Wexely."

"You knew her well then?"

"That's the thing," Poe laughed bitterly, "I barely did. She barely knew me either, but we just... found this peaceful coexistence in one another, and decided to roll with it." He looked down bitterly. "And now she's dead. Because of some STUPID FUCKING GAME!" He got up again. Finn looked down into the barrel, and his eyes widened.

"Guys! I, uh... found the tape." It was covered in his vomit, but at least he had found it. As he took it out though, Poe rushed over and grabbed it from him. "Poe!" Finn said, "Poe, listen to me, don't--"

The other man took it, and threw it against the barn walls. "THAT'S JUST WHAT YOU WANT, HUH?! For us to keep playing your little game! What next, you gonna toss me in a blender? HUH?!"

"Dameron," Ben said slowly, "Don't."

"You, you're givin' me lessons in restraint?" Poe snapped, "Fuck you, buddy."

"Poe," Finn came up to him, grabbing his shoulders. Poe tried to jerk free, but Finn held on. Ultimately he did have a little more muscle than Poe, and the shorter man eventually gave up, looking into Finn's eyes. "I know Jessika was your friend. But there's nothing you could've done."

"I could've injected them myself," Poe said, biting his lip. Finn was so close to him, and all he wanted to do was sink into those muscular arms and cry for days. But they didn't have that kind of time in this nightmare.

"If you could... would you have?" Finn asked earnestly, and when Poe tried to look away, Finn tilted his head back, imploring him to answer truthfully. Poe eventually breathed out, and backed away, going to grab a shovel lying against the door.

"I'm gettin' us out of here, before we get stuck in another one of those traps."

"Okay, hero complex," Ben muttered.

"What are _you_ doin' for us?" Poe shot back, "Taking temper tantrums and punching the walls?! That's not how you get out of this! You have to think like him." He looked around. "Like... this other door here!"

"It says no exit," Rey pointed out.

"Exactly. That's what he wants us to think," Poe said, "But freedom is probably on the other side of that door, and all it takes is one push."

"Poe, I really don't think you--" Finn tried to say, but Poe looked over at him pleadingly.

"I swear to god, Finn, I'm gonna take you on a date when we get outta here." Finn blushed, and Poe laughed. "Look at you! I just wanna kiss you, that's all we're gonna do, we're just gonna kiss, and... and Rey, you can come and visit us. Hell, Ben, I'll have you over too!"

"Fuck you and your orgy invitations," Ben retorted, and Poe shook his head.

"Just a couple steps away is sunlight." He took off his brown jacket, tossing it aside. Then he handed Finn a rake, and Ben an axe. "Come on." The two other men looked at each other, and finally agreed to help, walking up on the platform and bringing their tools down against the lock. Rey shook her head. They shouldn't be doing this. It wasn't part of the game.

Just then, a loud noise sounded, and faster than a shot, the three men were strung up by their feet from the ceiling by chains that tightened around their ankles.

From the morgue office, DJ smacked the side of the laptop. The feed had disappeared.

"What happened?!" Leia asked.

"The monitor went off!" DJ replied, "It's n-n-not streaming anymore!"

"Get it back," she told him, and the hacker started typing furiously.

In the barn, things were hectic.

"NO!" Rey cried, covering her mouth.

"This was a mistake!" Finn shouted.

"Huge!" she called up.

"I'm gonna fucking kill you, Dameron!" Ben shouted, trying to grab at his ankles. He made a noise, covering his blinded right eye. It was beginning to leak blood.

"Get in line, pal!" Poe replied, jerking in his chains, and their captor's horrible, drawling voice came out like a knife against stone.

 _"You cannot cheat my game, and you should know by now Poe, that cheating is a very dangerous thing."_ Finn looked over at Poe, who looked away.

_"Lucky Rey. You were the smart one... unfortunately, you must pay for the sins of the men you see before you in this little detour."_

"What?" she breathed, backing away, but they suddenly heard the sound of wheels. Out from the shadows of the back of the barn came the scarecrow Poe had seen earlier, with the pliers.

 _"You have a nasty habit. Not worse, perhaps, than Poe's habit of systematically cheating on his husband. But still an opportunity to learn a lesson."_ Rey scrunched her nose up in confusion _. "A fate worse than death awaits those who take shortcuts through life. They don't learn anything. A fate worse than death awaits Ben, Poe, and Finn... unless you stop it."_

"What, tell me what I have to do!" she shouted.

 _"You have three minutes, one per person, to go one step further from biting your nails."_ Rey's eyes immediately flew to the pliers in the scarecrow's hand, and let out a gasp. _"Extract one, one man will be freed. Extract none, they all meet their fate. You were wise not to heed Poe's idea-- you understand the rules of the game. It's a game of choice-- the power always lies with those the wisest."_

The voice disappeared, and Rey heard the ticking of a clock as the chains began to drag them on a ceiling track toward something in the corner. She let out a scream, and looked down at her fingernails.

\-----

"Can you get it back yet?!" Leia asked, and Rose stood on the other side of DJ.

"Yeah! How could it just go out like that?"

"I've l-l-looked... it's nothing wrong with the laptop. As I told you, they've blocked it... we c-c-can't see anymore."

Leia's nostrils flared. She was getting desperate, and when she got desperate, she was ready to lead her own raid. The only problem was that now, along with not having a location, they had no eyes on the situation.

\-----

The timer continued to tick, and they got closer and closer to the mysteriously cloaked contraption in the corner. Rey finally grabbed the pliers, and bit her lip hard as she closed the clamp around the nail of her ring finger. It was difficult to grasp the nail itself, as she had bitten them all to the quick, so she had to dig under the skin to get a hold of it. Starting to scream, she began to pull, and felt every single tug, crack, rip, and spurt as she tore her fingernail out. Excruciating pain emanated from her hand, and blood streamed from the open flesh. Ben's chains were released, and he fell to the ground in a cloud of dust, groaning. Rey cried as she moved on to her pinky nail, and Finn screamed.

"Don't do it, Rey! You _don't_ have to do it!"

"I... yes I do!" she shouted, biting her lip. She was in shock. Upside down and hanging, Finn turned to Poe. They only had one minute remaining now, and they were almost at the contraption. Rey couldn’t do it. She looked as if she was about to pass out.

 Finn took a deep breath, and swung himself over to Poe, grabbing his face and kissing him. Poe exhaled, enveloping Finn's lips and wrapping his arms around his neck.

Rey closed her eyes. Forty seconds left, and her head was spinning, fading in and out from the pain of what she had just done. She couldn't let them die. She couldn't be selfish, like that time... that time in the desert.

Gathering up the courage, she removed her belt and bit down on it as she squeezed the pliers onto her pinky nail, ripping with all her strength. She screamed into the belt until her voice was hoarse, teeth grinding in pain, and she tore out her pinky nail, watching it drop to the ground in a pool of blood. Her raw fingertips had now gone beyond the planes of pain, but Finn's chains undid, dropping him as he clung to Poe.

After a second, he let go, and ran over to Rey, hugging her and tearing up his shirt to wrap little pieces around her wounds. Finn held Rey as she screamed into his shoulder, taking the middle nail out. About halfway through tearing it out, it cracked down the middle, the sharp cuticle piercing her already raw, bleeding flesh. She screamed some more, and she removed both sides, dropping the pliers. She looked up at Finn, and passed out in his arms.

“Rey!” Finn knelt down, and Poe waited for his time to be released. Rey had taken out three nails-- that's what it took.

But he didn't drop—he simply kept going toward the contraption.

"What's... what's happening?" he asked softly, and Finn stood up, looking at Poe.

"Poe!"

"It's not stopping," Poe murmured in a panic, “Hey! It’s not stopping! She did it, asshole!” Just then, he stopped right above the contraption, and the voice came back, waking the young woman.

_"Very good, Rey. You've done your part for them. Now it is Poe's turn. Cheating is a terrible thing... confess."_

Poe sighed impatiently. "I didn't do anything. Everyone does it once in a while, it's a _normal_ _thing_!"

"Does what?" Finn asked cautiously.

"Yeah, what did you do, you queer?" Ben asked, and Rey slapped him on one side of his face, Finn the other. "Stop doing that!" he groaned, holding his face protectively and grimacing at the pain behind his eye again.

The chain dropped an inch, and Poe held his hands out. "Oh woah! It’s not a crime!” Another inch. “Agh, I did, okay! I cheated! I cheated on my husband! But everyone cheats once in a while!" Another couple of inches, and Poe shouted. "No! I-it was wrong, it was wrong, I shouldn't have, I..." he was silent, then he began to cry. "I fucked around at the bar, and it was my fault Snap killed himself, okay?! Is that what you wanna hear?!"

"Oh," Rey breathed softly.

_"Temmins "Snap" Wexely was your partner, your high school sweetheart. When he found out you had been cheating on him with other men from the bars you frequented, he couldn't take it. He took his own life."_

Poe's eyes closed. He had had to come home to find that, and right now, he really didn't need a reminder. "I wasn't satisfied anymore. Snap was never into the same shit I was into, he couldn't satisfy me! So I looked for a little something on the side in other places."

"What, you get off on people beating you up?" Ben interjected, "You get off on this shit that's happening to us?!"

"What? No!" Poe kept chewing on his bottom lip. "I finally found what I was looking for... then I came home, and found Snap in a pool of his own blood, a photo of us together in his hand.”

"Serves you right," Ben said.

"Will you just shut up?!" Rey hissed at him, and Ben makes a face at her as they watch Poe drop even further down.

_"I am so glad that you have confessed. You are a man of action, aren’t you Poe? Now, the action begins.”_

"You've gotta be kidding me," Poe shouted. Just then, the scarecrow reached out, and pulled the drape off the huge contraption. "Oh, fuck me," Poe whispered, and Finn grasped his head as he saw, Rey letting out a noise and even Ben screaming at the sight of it.

It was a long, circular funnel with blades all around the inside, which Poe was currently staring right down the middle of.

“No!” Finn shouted, “No no no no, no!” He was desperate, looking around frantically for anything to stop the deadly machine. The blades began to cycle, picking up speed.

_“If you reach the lever at the bottom of the Cyclone, you will be freed. Just as piloting a plane into the eye of a storm, you will need to pilot your descent. There are no ways to cheat this time, Mr. Dameron… the solution lies in you.”_

Poe bit his lip, and squeezed his fists as the chain began to descend.

“POE!” Finn screamed, and Ben looked around.

“Jam the lever!”

“What?” Finn muttered.

“Jam the controls!” Ben pointed. “There, right there. You can stop them.”

“No,” Poe tried to call, “No, don’t!” A smile slowly developed on his face. “I know what to do! I let it drop me down, until I reach the lever. I can't cheat, that’s it, I just let it go, and I’ll get out safe. DO NOT JAM THE CONTROLS!”

“Is he trying to say something?” Rey asked, and Finn shook his head.

“Just screaming. We’ve gotta jam those controls.”

“FINN! BEN, REY, DO YOU HEAR ME?! HE SAID I CAN’T CHEAT HIS GAME. I CAN'T CHEAT, OR IT’LL KILL ME!” The blades ate up his words, garbling them into mere screams the others heard.

“Do it, grab the shovel,” Ben said, and Finn looked up to the contraption, where Poe’s legs were just disappearing.

“It’s alright! We’re gonna get you out!”

“FINN!” Poe was screaming, “Finn stop!”

Finn ran and grabbed the shovel, and Poe continued to shout until he had lost his voice.

“FINN! REY! REY, TELL HIM! BEN! DON’T!”

“It’s gonna be okay!” Finn grinned, “I figured out a way to beat it, Poe!”

 Poe grimaced, trying to keep himself as thin as possible so that the blades wouldn’t touch him. He was about halfway down, and he could see the lever. The only way out of this now was to hope he would reach it before Finn jammed the controls.

Taking the shovel, Finn looked at the control panel, and saw the “on—off” button. Rey began to frown.

“Finn… wait. Doesn’t this seem a little conveniently placed?”

“We don’t have time to think about that, Poe’s gonna get torn to shreds!”

“He still might!”

Finn turned to her. “What?”

They heard Poe’s anguished screams, as inside the Cyclone, the blades were beginning to tear into his shoulders. He was almost there… so, so close to the lever… all he had to do was withstand a few flesh wounds and let the chain extend fully, and he’d beat it. He was going to make it. He would win, he wouldn’t end up like Hux, or Jessika.

Just… a little… closer…

“I’m coming!” Finn called, and took one look at the control panel, one look at the whirring contraption, and brought the shovel down on the circuit.

Inside the Cyclone, Poe barely grazed the lever with his pinky when he felt his chain jerk.

“No,” he whispered, eyes widening, “I—“

In a sharp snap, the pilot’s chain undid, and in a fast yell of fear, he put his arms up, the blades tossing him around in their relentless spin of gore. Finn, Rey, and Ben stood there, stunned, as Poe’s blood splattered all over them, bits of his flesh and skin spraying their clothing and faces.

“Ah… ah… AHHHHHH!” Finn broke down, falling to his knees and staring at the blood all over himself. Rey screamed as well, and Ben dragged hands through his hair as he began to shake. Poe’s flayed, mutilated corpse was lying a few feet away at the bottom of the contraption.


	5. The Shot

“There we g-g-go! Got it back,” DJ announced, and the feed from the deep web returned, showing an empty room with a shotgun in the middle. A pop up window showed as well, and DJ enlarged it. "Location, too."

“Where are they?” Leia whispered.

"Coordinates... to the c-c-countryside, it looks like. Five m-m-miles from here."

\-----

“Better him than me,” Ben said in the barn, frowning down at Poe’s corpse. Now it was Finn’s turn to get physical. He got up, and pushed Ben’s chest, getting close to his face.

“Why do shitty people like you get to live while good people like Poe die like that, huh?!” he screamed, tears streaming down his cheeks. Ben sneered.

“You think he was good?! Pilot boy fucked a bunch of guys and his husband killed himself because of it. Just think of what he’d do to you!”

“Both of you, stop it,” Rey came between them, “We can’t be fighting like this if we’re going to make it through. There’s only three of us left… I don’t want to lose any more.”

Another door opened, and they all looked into it. Before they entered, Finn grabbed Poe's discarded brown jacket, and slipped it on over his shoulders.

Walking in, they came to a small room with a TV. This room smelled of must and more of the thick iron. The television flickered on. “Another one,” Rey whispered, and comforted Finn as he cried into her. On the screen, there was a man in a black cloak, hooded. Rey blinked. She recognized him from the news… it couldn’t be. Snoke? Ben also seemed to recognize him from stories his mother used to warn him against, but not Finn. He hadn't the slightest idea who the man was.

_“As I said, we must all atone for our sins. The only way to do that is by eliminating the dark… the selfish. Not one, but two of you have experience with guns.”_

Finn and Rey looked at one another apprehensively, realizing again that they still didn’t know one thing about each other. But they also didn’t know much about the tall, pale man across the room. He confirmed their suspicions as he nodded.

“Me,” he said, “I do. I shot up a store because they wouldn’t give me my medication.”

“What… medication?” Rey asked.

“None of your fucking business.”

“Meds to get high, I’m sure,” Finn scoffed, and Ben punched him. Finn held his face, and the voice came back.

_“There is a single bullet in the gun… all it takes to determine who the heroes and the villains of this story are. Choose carefully… your true nature can be a strength and a weakness. The key to freedom is in the eye of the beholder.”_

The taller man walked over to the gun. “I’ve got lots of experience with these.”

“You used a rifle?” Rey winced. Ben inspected the rifle left for them in the middle of the room.

“No. But I know how to use one… my dad used to take me out hunting. He’s a detective… he needs to be a sharp shot.” His eyes took on a darker light. “I wish I could aim this gun at him.”

“You’re just as psychotic as the fucker doing this to us!” Finn shouted, and Ben pointed the gun at him.

“Yeah… maybe I am. Maybe I should join him. Maybe I will, once I kill you both.”

“There’s only one bullet in the gun,” Rey reminded, swallowing. Ben nodded slowly.

“True. So which one of you should I kill?” He aimed at Rey… then dragged the barrel over to Finn. Finn stared, noticing the deadly glint in Ben's eye, and backed up against the wall.

“Ben…”

“Wait,” Rey said, “He said _two_ people. Two people in this room have experience with guns. The other has to be you, Finn… I’ve never used one in my life.” Finn spent a long time looking at her, and nodded.

“I used a gun."

"What did you do?" Finn looked down. "You have to say it, you have to confess, remember?!" Rey glanced at him pleadingly, half pleading for him to tell and half pleading that it wasn't that bad.

"I… I was out with my buddies in high school, Nines, Slip, and Phasma. We weren’t good kids. We stole, we drank—we got arrested for vandalism. One night, we went into this diner… and my friends, they pulled out guns, and tossed me one. ‘Shoot ‘em up’, they told me, and they barred the doors, just going from table to table killing everyone. I couldn’t do it… I held the gun at this poor woman’s face, and she looked completely powerless. I couldn’t just take her life like that.

“So you have the motive to die,” Ben said, “Just like pansy said… vigilante justice.”

“Do you really think you’re better than him?!” Rey cried, “You willingly killed an entire store full of people!”

“So what, you want to die for him?”

“Why should you get the gun anyway?” Finn asked, rushing toward him. Ben fought him off, grabbing the gun again and knocking him upside the head with it. Finn fell face first on the hard floor, and Ben aimed at the back of his head, pushing the barrel against him.

“Consider this day one of my training… master Snoke.”

“NO!” Rey screamed, and Finn’s eyes suddenly flew open as he grabbed her wrist, keeping her down.

“True nature. Selfishness. _Eliminating the dark_.” He looked at her, and she figured it out too. Finn flipped around, taking the barrel between his hands.

“Ben don’t, it’s--!” he started to say, but Ben pulled the trigger. All in one split second, a loud crack went off, and blood sprayed the walls… eyes opened, and Finn and Rey looked across the room to Ben's mangled face where the bullet had backfired through his right eye, leaving a long scar down his face and a hole in what was left of his skull.

"Did..." Finn squeaked, "Did that just happen?" 

“It was going to backfire,” Rey murmured in fascination, “It was _rigged_ to backfire, because the person pulling the trigger was being selfish, taking another life.”

“That he wasn’t meant to take,” Finn nodded, and they both looked down at Ben. After a moment, they stepped over his body, and got to the door… but it was locked.

“It’s still locked,” Rey whispered.

“Oh god,” Finn said, “Maybe he wants more…”

“Wait, Finn!” Rey blurted, “He said something about, uh… uh, an eye! Eye of the beholder!” Finn nodded.

“Right, right! The key is in the eye of the beholder.” They both turned down to look at Ben, and peered into the eye socket that had been blown… to find a glinting key.

“Oh my god,” Rey said, grabbing Finn’s arm. “This entire time, Ben was complaining about his eye. He has a scar, and he’d been blinded… Finn, the man planned this! He planted the key behind Ben’s eye when he chained him up, because he knew how each game would turn out. He predicted the game, Finn! He knew who would end up where, when we would, and how we would do everything!”

“So… the game is predetermined?” Finn asked in horror.

“In a way, yes! It’s as if he’s playing his own game of betting, watching us play this. He bet Ben would make it to this stage of the game and try to shoot one of us based on who he was and what he’d done. He bet by putting the key behind his eye.”

“So that means… he knows our next moves,” Finn swallowed. Rey looked gravely at Finn. This time, she let the man take her hand as they took the key, entering the next, and possibly final, room.

\-----

“He was gonna kill the others.”

“You don’t know that, Han.”

“I do, you saw him!”

“But why did he have to die?!” Leia asked.

“It’s his way,” Rose said, “Snoke—“

“I know what he does,” Leia snapped, “I played his little game.”

“What?” Han asked,

“Back in '84, he took me and my brother. We were part of something our dad did… he took us, and he killed my brother. Or watched my brother kill himself, I don’t know… but I had to watch too. To this day, I still hear his screams when I close my eyes.”

“But… you told me Luke died in an accident,” Han frowned.

“It was an accident. It shouldn’t have happened!” Leia said, sitting down. “I should’ve known he couldn’t survive the trap… I should’ve done it, and then I wouldn’t have survived.”

“Survivor's guilt," Rose swallowed. "My older sister was killed in a hit and run. I lived, she didn't. I get it."

Leia looked at the young coroner, and wrapped her in a hug. Han stood beside them, shocked into silence.

"Honey, I never... I never knew," he tried, but Leia just shook her head, taking his hand.

"Because I never told you."

Just then, DJ smacked his fist on the desk. "Gotcha."

"What?" Rose gathered around, frowning slightly, "W-what do you mean?"

"The exact coordinates."

"You found them?" Her eyes shifted to the screen weakly, then back to Han and Leia. Leia looked back at Han.

"We can get to the two that are left."

"I'll get a squadron," Han nodded.

Rose stared after him.


	6. The Garage

Finn and Rey walked into the room, and jumped as the door from the previous one swung shut. There was no going back... one, both, or none of them would leave this room alive.

"There has to be a tape."

"Look around," Rey nodded, and she stooped down. "Here."

Finn looked over, and saw the tape. Just as Rey picked it up, a wire underneath it holding it to the ground snapped, and four glass walls fell around them.

"NO!" Rey cried, and Finn pounded on it. It was no use-- the walls encasing them were solid. Finn looked at her solemnly, and nodded to the tape. She pressed play.

_"Welcome to the final test. It requires a great amount of smarts-- something you both have shown throughout the game. But we must not lose sight of the lesson you must learn."_

"I think we've learned a lot of lessons," Rey snapped, "Like all the ways we're going to kill you when we make it out of here!" The tape went on.

"To take another life is a sin. To indirectly take a life, is still a sin. But it can be forgiven... with a confession."

Rey looked up at Finn. "I'm the only one who hasn't confessed." She brushed her hair aside. "I was in the middle of the desert, four years ago. I had run out of gas, and had been out there for two days without water... I saw someone drive by, so I flagged him down. His name was Unkar Plutt... he wouldn't help me. For whatever reason, he wouldn't help me, and I just..." She closed her eyes. "I went animalistic on him. I started punching, and beating until he was out cold.. I dragged him from car, and I stole it. Two weeks later, the police found a body by the side of the highway." She shook her head. "But I didn't mean to kill him. I needed to get home, my parents probably thought I was dead. It wasn't my fault."

Finn exhaled. "Alright. You've confessed. Now what?"

Suddenly, the tv in front of them turned on, and revealed the same man with the black robe.

"It is you," Rey breathed.

"Who?"

"Snoke Plagueis," Rey whispered.

"The Jigsaw killer?!" Finn blurted, "But he died ten years ago!"

 _"I should have,"_ the hooded figure said. The voice sent chills through the two. _"The light is what kept me going."_

"Why didn't you spare Ben?" Finn asked, "He wanted to work with you."

_"He was a selfish boy, who did not think. He was far too dark to fully understand the true extent of my work. He enjoyed killing."_

"And you don't?!" Rey scoffed.

_"No. You two show great promise. Are you ready to cross over to the light?"_

Rey backed up. "You knew we would get here, Finn and me. What are we doing in this box?"

Snoke chuckled, and a thick mist began to spray through the tubes inserted inside, filling the tight air. _"What you are breathing is carbon monoxide. You have five minutes before it will kill you. You've shown backbone throughout the game, which is why you've survived... salvation from The Garage is yours if you can find the last key."_

"Carbon monoxide," Finn said.

"Like from a car," Rey groaned.

"Okay, so he leaves us clues, right?" Finn asked, running his hands through his hair, "He always says shit he wants us to remember."

"Salvation... smarts..." Just then, it dawned on Rey, and her blood ran cold. "Backbone. Key. The key is in one of our backs." Finn's hand slowly reached up behind himself to run a hand over the fresh scar, now dripping blood from being recently stitched.

Two scalpels dropped from the tubes.

\-----

"Hurry it up, move out!" Han called to his force, "You've all got the brief!" He got in his own car with his rescue K9, Chewbacca. "This is quite a night, Chewie. This morning, we were talking about a dead man walking-- then, I find out my wife survived the murderous wrath of said dead man, and now, we're on our way to find the bastard!"

Chewbacca let out a howl, and they were on their way as fast as they could to the coordinates DJ had extracted.

"Are you okay?" Leia asked over the police radio about ten minutes later, and Han took his off of his chest.

"We're almost there. It's out in the country somewhere... at a farm house, looks like."

"With an underground," Leia glanced back at the screen, then frowned. "What the...?" She noticed how the box Finn and Rey were trapped in had become fogged, and she saw the woman's hand slap against the glass in desperation. She got back on the radio. "Han. You've gotta hurry."  

\-----

"He put it in your back!?" Rey asked, shaking her head wildly.

"Just like the key behind Ben's eye, he did it before we all woke up, when he kidnapped us. Rey, I can still feel the stitches. I can feel the blood!"

"How did he even find us?" Rey asked, "The last thing I was doing was buying groceries... I walked out behind the store, and I don't remember much of anything after that."

"I was sleeping in the warehouse at my work," Finn remembered, "Then I woke up here."

Rey looked at Finn, a determined look in her eye. "We're going to do this."

"We are?" he asked nervously, and she nodded.

"Yes. Turn around."

"Aw fuck," Finn winced, and did so. Rey picked up one of the scalpels, and stumbled a little.

"Finn..."

He turned. "Rey?"

"Finn, I'm..." Her eyelids were drooping, and she dropped the scalpel.

"Rey! Hey, here-- breathe into my shirt." He removed his black shirt, giving it to her. She grabbed for it, holding against her nose, but she stumbled again, falling over against the wall.

"Get the key... Finn, get..." she breathed. The air was so thick they could barely see each other now, and Finn was getting a little woozy too.

"Rey," he managed out. He felt the leather of Poe's jacket against his skin, covering up the blood he had all over him-- his own, mixed with Poe's, mixed with Rey's, mixed with a little of Jess's and Ben's. Hux had been isolated back when he died, so he was the only one Finn wasn't currently wearing.

He grasped Poe's jacket, and saw his amber eyes in his mind as he heard his voice.

_"I just wanna kiss you."_

_"That's all we're gonna do, we're just gonna kiss."_

_"You've gotta think like him."_

_"You can't cheat, his game, his rules."_

**_"Games can be beaten."_ **

Finn forced his eyes open, and took a scalpel, jamming it into his back and ripping downward with a loud scream.

\----

"There it is, go, go!" Han got on his radio. "Lando, you in?"

"Yeah, man. Just purged the back door, and---" Han was startled by the loud shout his partner let out.

"What, what is it?" Han started to jog over to the farmhouse, where the rest of his team had surrounded the premises.

"G-god! Solo, you'd better get in here and see this!"

Han stood beside the barn doors. His radio went off.

"Y-you know the odds of surviving a bust like this are minimal right?" Lando said over the radio. Han took a deep breath.

"Never tell me the odds." He shook his head, looking over his shoulder. "I'm gettin' too old for this." He whipped around, and kicked the doors open, running in to meet his partner... and find the body he was staring at, all ripped to pieces. "Shit," he muttered, "What a mess." Chewie began to bark, and directed them all over to a pile of hay. The dog dug through it, and a bloody arm fell off, attached to a girl who looked like half her face had eroded and begun to decompose.

"Another victim, sir!" one officer said. Han looked up at him over the body.

"You don't say!"

_"Han?"_

Han picked up his radio. "Leia. I'm alright. We breached the farmhouse... we're gonna look for the two kids now."

_"Bring them home safe."_

"I will."

_"And you-- don't die."_

Han smirked. "You know me. I'm invincible."

In the morgue, Rose began to take off her scrubs. "I'll be right back. I've got some things to take care of."

\----

Finn screamed as he dug into his back. He had no idea exactly where the key would be... he just had to search for it. It was excruciatingly painful, and he was sweating-- Rey was on the ground, passed out from the monoxide, and he was getting there himself, were it not for the sheer adrenaline of possibly cutting off his mobility.

"Ah!" he cried, "Aha!" The key was caught on one of his damn vertebrae. He slowly began to pull it out, wondering what miracle saved him from rendering him completely unable to walk, and bit his fist. The pain was unbearable, and he was fading in and out of consciousness... just as he was about to pull the key out completely, the scalpel he held nicked something-- he let out a bloodcurdling scream as he severed a nerve.

The key flew from his hands to the other side of the box, which Finn could barely see now. Through his blurring vision, he saw Rey slumped over, blood streaks on the glass from where she had hit it with her bleeding fingertips. He faintly registered the sound of his own screaming, and felt the dull throbbing of pain he could never have imagined coming from his back.

Then, everything went numb. He couldn't feel anything from the waist down... _shit. Shit, shit, shit._

He tried to drag himself to get the key, but it was so far away, and he couldn't even remember why he was doing it. Where was he? Why was he here again? Whose jacket was this? Wasn't he just sleeping in the warehouse?

\----

"In here!" Han shouted, and Lando followed him with everyone else. They had found the room after the barn... which meant---

"Oh god," Lando put a hand on Han's chest, "Man, you don't wanna..."

"No," Han said quietly, and knelt down by the body of his son, inspecting it. "What a shot." He stayed there for a good minute, just staring, until he got on his radio. "Leia? I found him."

"Our son?" Her voice wavered.

"Yeah." He sighed. "Or what's left of him."

Leia's eyes closed. "Make sure someone gets the body out of there. All of the bodies?"

"Yeah," Han repeated, and got up. The image of Ben like that would haunt him for the rest of his life... if he was so lucky to make it out of here alive. "Alright, kick the door down."

"It's locked," the police officer from earlier said, and Han pinched the bridge of his nose.

"I just said _kick_ it down, asshat!" The man nervously nodded, and about three officers got in formation.

"One-- two--- THREE!"

Finn's eyelids fluttered as he heard another noise added to the mix of his screams and the expression of the gas in the box. He vaguely made out the shapes of dark uniforms flooding the room, and heard the cracks against the glass as heavy bars were used. After one, two, three smacks, the glass around them shattered, and Rey collapsed on her back. Finn gasped for air, and the officers surrounded them.

"Hey, she breathing?!" Han asked the man who was holding Rey. He didn't wait for a response. "Get them both to the ambulance. Now!" As everyone hurried out of the room, holding their sleeves over their mouths, he took a look around. The room gave him the creeps... just as he was about to leave, he found a tape on the ground. It read, "Play Me".

Looking around, the chief of police put it up to his ear. He should really take it in for evidence, but...

" _Greetings, Mr. Solo. I see you've found your son. A pity you won't be able to attend the funeral with your wife."_

As Han figured out too late what the tape meant, the door to the room slammed shut.

\----

Finn came to in the hospital gurney, being pulled into the ambulance on his stomach. Wondering why Rey wasn't there alongside him, he looked up... and his already irregular heart skipped a beat.

As she was being wheeled by, he caught a good glimpse of her face-- the whites of her eyes had hemorrhaged with blood, and her nose had a trail of dried blood coming from it, running down over the smattering of freckles to her wide open mouth. A sheet was pulled over her head, and Finn fell back into his gurney.  

"Jacket..." he whispered, his voice hoarse, "Where's... where's the jacket...?"

"We've got it with us," the driver nodded, "It was the only thing the police brought back from the scene, because you were clutching to it for dear life."

"Mmpph," Finn finally relaxed, and fell asleep again.


	7. The Final Piece

The next time Finn woke up, he was in an actual hospital bed. The lights were on, and they were bright... just like the lights in the room with the chains, and the gun, and the--

"Hey. You okay?"

Finn blinked again, and looked over to see an older woman with greying brown hair and a soft smile.

"Who..." Finn winced. His back hurt, and he still couldn't talk. "Who are you?"

"Doesn't matter," she said, "I know how you feel."

"Oh," Finn huffed a laugh, his ribs aching, "I seriously doubt that, lady."

"I was a victim of one of his traps too." Finn looked up at her. "But I sacrificed my brother. And now, I should have known I'd have to sacrifice my son and my husband to him too."

"You know about him?" Finn asked, lowering what was left of his voice. Leia nodded.

"I know what it's like to be the winner of the game."

Finn let out a long breath, his monitor beeping steadily. "All those people... they didn't deserve to die."

"They never do," Leia sighed, "I became a detective because I thought it would help me come to terms with what happened. Help people, avoid anything like this happening again. But it's impossible to stop it."

Finn nodded. He understood. It was impossible to stop-- no matter how hard they had tried, it had been impossible. In the end, six of the seven had died, and the horrible game had been played. Suddenly, it dawned on Finn.

"Your son... you're Ben's mother." His eyes slid shut. "Nobody should have to go through that... I'm so sorry." Leia got up, and took his hand.

" _I'm_ sorry."

With his other hand, Finn slowly reached over to the chair beside the bed to feel the material of Poe's jacket. He could still feel the dry cracks of blood in the sleeve, blood that belonged to Poe, to Rey... he would always feel it there, no matter what he did.

Outside the door, Rose Tico stood, waiting by the door. She smiled a little, thinking of all the wonderful ways she would have the next seven atone... atone for what those criminals did to her sister a decade ago. No criminals deserved to live, unless they knew what they were. Scum. Dirt. Less than human. Pigs to be slaughtered.

She hummed to herself as she fingered the voice changing device in her pocket, and returned to her morgue. She set the device on the table, and walked past the row of the recovered bodies on the table from her sister's old farmhouse. Each one had a puzzle piece missing from their skin. She walked over, and took the chip out of the computer, and, slicing it in half with a pair of surgical scissors, dropped the remains into acid. She then opened the fridge, and took out the puzzle pieces in the airtight bag, peeling it open to add Han's.

"Let the games begin," she whispered, and closed the fridge door.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> .... I'm sorry? haha


End file.
